


And Should I Stay, What Then?

by mayamaia



Series: Maycury Week [3]
Category: Queen (Band)
Genre: M/M, Magic AU, fairytale AU, oh well, probably more plot too, this world definitely deserves more development oh well
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-03
Updated: 2020-09-03
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:49:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26269021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mayamaia/pseuds/mayamaia
Summary: Maycury Week day 4: Magic AUTransparently inspired by My Fairy King...
Relationships: Brian May/Freddie Mercury
Series: Maycury Week [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1906696
Comments: 6
Kudos: 17
Collections: Maycury_Week_2020





	And Should I Stay, What Then?

Brian hurried through the sunset woods, orange spears of light cutting through the trees overhead. He had a satchel full of picnic foods - cheeses, half a loaf, and a few apples he’d picked on the way. He’d be able to spend the twilight hour with Freddie before they each had to return to their own worlds, and he didn’t want to waste it.

But as he stepped around a tree, nearing his destination, he saw what looked at first like a pile of cloth on the trail ahead of him. Only it moved, and groaned, and a beloved face came into view.

Brian startled, then ran forward and kneeled down. “Freddie? What happened?!”

Freddie turned his face up to his friend and opened his eyes with a glazed expression. Brian felt a twitch against his hand and looked down to see something terrible had happened to Freddie’s wings - no longer bright like the rainbow flash of a prism, but the oozing colors of an oil slick.

* * *

Brian had first found the forest pool a year ago, after following a young fox family he’d been admiring for days. They had been picking their way down a deer trail, when the vixen had stopped, looked back at him as if she knew he’d been trying to keep a respectful distance behind, and then disappeared down a hole in the bank. Brian would have turned back then, but he’d seen a hint of water reflections glinting on the trees. And he’d heard a voice.

“Names of flowers and sweet things are all very well, but they aren’t ME. I want something more regal. Startling, and incandescent. I shan’t be something you see every day.”

Brian had peered around the trees, and saw a young man with no shirt leaning over the sparkling water of - it was hardly large enough even to call a pond, just 12 feet across and with no visible source, it was probably a spring - and seemingly holding a conversation with his own reflection. A young man who sported diaphanous wings that appeared and disappeared like a turning crystal as they waved restlessly at his back.

Brian rubbed his eyes as the... fairy? continued, “Argent is too simple. But Mercury, a mystery, always moving! That is what I’ll choose. Mercury is me.”

Brian laughed, and said aloud, “A fine planet to grace the sky, as well!”

The fairy, who had been Freddie, jumped up and stumbled back. “Who - how did you find your way in here? Where have...” He trailed off as he looked above Brian’s shoulders and relaxed. “Oh, a human! How delightful, darling!”

Brian raised his eyebrows. “Oh, should I fear you’ll steal me away? Maybe I have salt in me pockets.”

The fairy waved a hand. “Oh, no, I have no use for a thrall, and I haven’t got your name, boy.”

Brian smiled. “That seems hardly fair, as I already have yours.”

“What…!” The fairy glanced searchingly around, even patting at the pocket hung around his waist. “I just made that, give it back!” he said, faintly outraged.

Brian raised his eyebrows. “What, Mercury?”

The fairy clasped a hand over his throat and carefully tested the word. “Mercury. Yes, that’s me!” He stood up straighter, and faced Brian with his chin up, saying, “I suppose you expect I owe you a debt, now.”

“Oh, well.” Brian had found it funny as an idea, but ‘Mercury’ had been frantic for an instant there. “I didn’t mean to take anything from you, and I don’t want to put you out either.”

The fairy blinked at him. “But you have. Debts must be paid, and if you do not choose the means, I must.”

Brian did actually know that - he was apprenticed to an enchanter. “Then I shall think of something,” he said, carefully. “If I understand correctly, you can pay by gifts or by acts or by words.”

A smile spread slowly across Mercury’s face. “Oh, a cautious one.”

Brian cleared his throat. “A learned one. Or at least I am learning.”

“Then you will want words,” Mercury said, warily. “Or a thrall of your own.”

Brian shook his head. “I will phrase this with care, and I will not have finished my choosing until I declare it finished.” He took a deep breath, and looked the fairy in the eyes, swallowing at his steady returned gaze. “In payment, I ask that you help me to settle the debt between us so that neither of us is detained, in service, harmed or lost, or otherwise unable to develop a sincere and genuine acquaintance of equals.” Brian swallowed, and tried to think of anything he hadn’t covered, then nodded half to himself. He concluded with, “My choosing is finished.”

Mercury’s face had erupted in an awed sort of joy. He tilted his head. “You are ...refusing to be tricky as the tales declare humans to be. Or as foolish.” He looked around the clearing with the spring at the center. “This is a middle place. I have no reign over it, nor does the human world. It may be entered from both, most easily at half-moons and twilights, but I have worked a spell here today to give me time to talk with my reflection and choose my name in full privacy from the faerie kingdom. I’m afraid this made it more open to the human world instead. You will be able to leave without trouble, and so shall I as long as I return to my own home and not yours. If you went to my home or I to yours after time spent here, time would relax its hold on this crossroads and years could pass in our homes before we return.” Then he looked seriously back at the apprentice enchanter. “But though you have released my name to me, you still know it, and we cannot be equals this way.”

Brian had cleared his throat, and bit his lip, then looked up. “I do not give you my name but keep it for myself. Brian is and will always remain my name.”

The fairy looked deeply touched, and laughed. “You are exceeding generous, and have added to the debt I owe you.”

Brian smiled. “Then become my true friend, and we shall have debts no more.”

The fairy shook his head and stretched his wings. “You may call me Freddie, that no further eavesdroppers can take my name from your lips as long as you protect it.”

Brian nodded, and said, “You may use a diminutive of my name, or if you wish to be even more cautious… May is this month, you may call me May.”

* * *

“Freddie, can you speak? Why did you come beyond the pool, what happened?” Brian was trying not to sound frantic.

The fairy spoke weakly, but clearly. “I was pursued. I needed Time to protect me.” His wings twitched again. “I might be poisoned, darling. Or simply cursed.”

“Pursued? Then may I take you to shelter? To my master’s library, where I can try to stop what’s been done to you?” Brian didn’t really believe that Freddie would accept, would move even farther into the human world, but Freddie nodded wearily and put out an arm to brace against Brian’s shoulders as he helped him up.

The last rays of sunset faded where they pierced the treetops, and the wind began to rise. Brian fingered the acorns he kept in his pocket - normally guardians against animals he might encounter on the way home, he considered how useful they might be against a thinking opponent, one used to at least as much magic as he had. More, most likely. But as the sky dimmed, and Freddie’s slight form weighed more heavily against his side, he was too busy with guiding their footsteps out of the forest to dwell heavily on the possibility of Freddie being followed. The darkening grey made the forest depths ghostly and the noises of Brian and Freddie’s shared footfalls silenced only the creatures closest to them.

“Freddie, do you think it would be alright for me to raise a light?”

Freddie made a confused sort of groan before he seemed to understand. “Do what you’d normally do, Bri, they could come tomorrow or next year at this point. Or a hundred years, or in two minutes.” After several more steps and a few stuttered breaths, he added, “Hardly worth following me through the broken ring, darling, might just declare the battle won and they wouldn’t be wrong.”

Brian held his friend a little tighter for a moment, then he lifted his unoccupied hand and spoke light into being over his palm. With this lantern overhead, he and Freddie emerged from the trees onto the cart track, less than half a mile from the town.

* * *

Brian knocked urgently on the door of the healer’s apprentice. “Roger! Rog, are you in?”

After a few moments, there was a shuffling noise and a tousled blonde head poked out the door. Roger looked at Brian with impatience and asked, “Is it urgent? I’ve already had a bloody awful day grinding powders of things. Some of it was teeth, I had to grind down teeth, Brian.”

Brian nodded seriously. “I’ve got a guest who needs you over at my quarters at the library.”

“Why didn’t you ask for my master?”

“He gossips worse than John’s granny. You at least can keep a secret.”

Roger perked up. “Knocked up one of the girls on Beltane, did ya?”

“Rog, seriously.”

“Ooh, or was it someone’s wife an’ he’s got nicer hair?” Despite the ribbing, Roger was gathering his coat and haversack.

“Roger! The guest is a he.”

Roger snorted as he closed his door. “Brian, I never knew you had it in you!”

“Any other time, Rog, I wouldn’t mind, but this ain’t funny.” Stepping onto the track, a little farther out of earshot of the houses, Brian said lowly, “He’s not from here, Rog. You can’t give him your name.”

Roger stopped and stared at him. “Did you capture a fairy, Brian? Your master won’t…”

“He has his name and I still have mine,” Brian said, not adding that they did know one another’s names. “We think he might be poisoned.”

Roger started walking with him again. “What makes you think he won’t be poisoned further by human healing, Bri?”

Brian sighed. “Hope, I guess.”

* * *

The enchanters’ library was on a small hill at the edge of town, where its roof could serve as a platform for observing the sky. Light shone from the windows, stronger than the one Brian had left for his guest. He hastened his steps, and Roger scurried to keep up, so as to stay within the circle of the witch-light Brian carried.

But when they entered the main hall, they only saw Brian’s fellow apprentice, John, chatting amiably to Freddie as he fiddled with the lenses on a device he was using to examine the fairy’s wings.

“That looks quite a lot more involved than Bri’s work,” Freddie was saying, “what he’s shown me, at any rate.”

“Yeah well, that’s because he’s more focused on theory than practice. Especially stars and planets and things.” John looked up. “Oh, excellent. Have you brought any thyme in your pocket? I think it’s a curse after all.”

Roger moved forward, “Isn’t that supposed to be against fairy magic, Deaky?” he asked, trying not to stare at Freddie while also trying to see what was wrong with him.

Brian answered instead of John, “If it’s a curse, it was another fairy that did him the mischief.” John nodded without looking up from his lenses. Brian turned to Freddie, “I see you’ve met Deaky - sorry for not being here for that.” John waved a hand as if finding a sick fairy laid across the library couches with a salt circle surrounding the entire library was a regular occurrence.

Freddie raised his eyebrows. “He says that you’re going to owe him a proper favor after this, darling.”

Brian laughed. It was a clever way around having _Freddie_ owe John a favor. “Thank you, Deaky. And you might have guessed that Freddie is the friend I’ve been visiting in the evenings when I can.”

“And here I was so convinced you had a girl,” John said in such a blank tone that it was clear he hadn’t believed it from the start.

“And this,” Brian told Freddie, indicating Roger, “is the fellow I told you about who plays music with me at the festivals. Deaky plays with us sometimes too.”

“Hullo blondie,” Freddie said with a tired smile.

“Oi, it’s Roger! - oh fuck,” he said with sudden horror.

John froze, but Freddie just shook his head and laughed. “Roger is and will always be your name. Now, darling, can you tell me what it would be safe to call you where other fae, who are not already benefiting from your expert help, might be listening?”

“Uh,” Roger said, looking to Brian for assurance, “Is Rog alright?”

Brian laughed and nodded. “Well that’s solved the problem of how to sort out Roger’s help. Though I was thinking he’d like one of your songs, Freddie.”

The fairy huffed a laugh and laid his head against the back of the couch. “Then we’ll just have to make music together when I’m sorted, too.”

* * *

Half an hour later, Freddie was awkwardly huddled inside a circle that they’d all drawn, and John was carefully drawing the last twiddles and placing pinches of thyme and other powders from Roger’s haversack in very particular places. He had waved Brian off to make them some tea out of Master Beach’s private stash - he’d gotten real tea leaves off a merchant the previous autumn - mostly to get rid of the distraction of Brian pacing. Roger had gone with him to make sure he brought back plenty of biscuits.

“So,” John said with some trepidation, “He hasn’t got your real name, has he? Cause our master would throw him right out for that.”

Freddie gave a soft laugh, and answered, “He hasn’t made me his thrall, deacon’s son.” He sighed, and added softly, “It’s much worse, really. A thrall can escape, from being clever or having determined friends. Bri has tied us together much more permanently than that.”

John looked puzzled, like he was just about to ask for elaboration, but just then their companions entered the room with the tea and a heaping plate of biscuits. Brian put his burden down and hurried over to hand Freddie’s share across the growing spell, the most affectionate look on his worried face that John had ever seen there. It was returned in kind, Freddie’s fingers lingering over Brian’s for a moment before he took the tea.

“Oh,” John said after watching them for a moment. Freddie glanced over him and shrugged, a _What can we do?_ gesture, and John busied himself with the last of the spell.

There was no instant effect when John closed the circle, but the dark and nebulous swirling seeped out of Freddie’s wings, making them simultaneously brighter and more transparent while the little piles of thyme blackened. Roger seemed to be holding his breath, Brian was watching the spell circle like a hawk intent on a sparrow. Freddie hardly showed a change in expression, but gradually slumped as if all his muscles had been clenched moments before and were finally released.

And then John was stepping forward to break the circle, mumbling “You’re going to do the sweeping and scrubbing, Bri.” But Brian didn’t answer, just stepped forward to give an arm for Freddie to pull himself up.

“I suppose you’ll need to go back at dawn,” Brian said, and if he sounded a little forlorn it could be taken as weariness at the late hour.

But Freddie shook his head. “The Rhye I return to won’t be the one I left. Long or short, my time here won’t help my returning, only the ease of finding the crossroads.”

Brian dropped his head and nodded. “My master will be back midmorning. He might be able to make it safe for you to stay in town for however long.” He looked up. “You’re welcome to my quarters. It won’t be kingly…”

“I’m not a king anymore, darling.”

Brian nodded, and slid the arm Freddie was leaning on more firmly around his back, just under the center of his wings so they could fold delicately over it.

Before they left the room, Brian looked back. “Rog -”

“I’ll take the library couch.”

Brian nodded. “Music on your next day off. And I’ll see my mum for those rolls you like. Deaky?”

John shook his head. “Go to bed. You’ll pay me back if Ronnie’s ever in similar trouble.”

Brian paused for a moment, then said, “I swear it by my arm, I will.”

John snorted. “I know you will. You could swear it by Mercury and I’d know you would.”

Brian stiffened for a moment, but John was already back to looking at the spell under his feet, and Roger was busying himself with settling a throw over the couch. Freddie touched Brian’s shoulder gently, as if to tell him _Everything’s alright, darling,_ and Brian relaxed and continued to guide him over to the apprentice quarters to settle in for the night.

**Author's Note:**

> ...I really do like the idea that the effects of entering Faerie go both ways...


End file.
